


the awakening

by orphan_account



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Arthur Pendragon Returns, F/M, Gen, Slight reference to hallucinations, but i mean if i spent 1000 years alone i'd be a bit crazy too
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-30
Updated: 2017-08-30
Packaged: 2018-12-21 21:00:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11952546
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The Return of Arthur Pendragon.Or,In which Arthur Pendragon wakes up at the bottom of a lake. And his manservant has a wife.Lovely stuff.





	the awakening

**Author's Note:**

> Heyyyyyyyy!
> 
> I wrote another Merlin fanfic (since I'm hardcore obsessed with it) and I actually have a longer one on the way!

 

It was dark. That was the first thing the spark of consciousness recognized. It was dark, and he was alone.

_Who is “he”?_

_I am he._

_Who am I?_

The conscience brought forth the mental equivalent of a frown. Then, a name appeared.

_Arthur Pendragon._

_Why is it dark?_

_Open your eyes._

Arthur did so, looking around at the unfamiliar surroundings.

_Where am I?_

His memories slammed into his head, chaotic and disoriented and faces flashed through his mind as he desperately tried to name them.

_Guinevere. Gwaine. Morgana. Leon. Percival. Elyan. Lancelot. Gaius. Merlin._

_Merlin!_

He remembered now, the image forming clearly. Becoming wounded, Merlin taking him to a lake, bleeding out…

Dying.

He remembered dying.

So where was he now? Did the magic of the lake work? Was he alive?

He began to take notice of his surroundings, and immediately came to a conclusion.

Light filtered above him, gold and shining and beautiful, but what was above him was not the sky. It rippled and swam before his eyes, fascinating and disturbing at the same time.  
  
Arthur tore his eyes away from the light and looked around.

Seaweed, and fish floated around him, lazy, as if he wasn’t there at all. His shoes rested in muddy, sandy ground. As he craned his eyes upwards once more, he could barely make out the tips of his short hair floating up.

He was in the lake. At the bottom of the lake.

_How am I still breathing?_

Arthur pondered this for a few moments before coming to a startling realization.

_I’m not._

He kept deliberately still for a while (minutes? Hours? He couldn’t tell), and sure enough, there was no rise and fall of his chest, no air entering his nose (well, he was at the bottom of a lake. But that didn’t explain this) and if he truly focused, there was no pulse, either.

_I’m dead._

“You’re not. You were, though, for a long time.”

He whipped around, coming face-to-face with a woman. She was pretty, yes, with warm eyes and a smile on her face as she looked at him.

“Who- Who are you? Why am I at the bottom of a lake? What’s going on? And what do you mean ‘a long time’?” The questions raced out of him, desperate and confused as he was.

“My name is Freya. I am the Lady of the Lake. You’re in the Lake of Avalon, where you died. You’re awake now. My husband will be very happy to hear you're truly alive once more. He’s waited for you for a very long time.”

“Your...husband? The Lady of the Lake has a husband?”

She laughed, a lovely sound that filled the silence of the water around them.

“Yes, I do. Come, he is waiting. He knew the very second you woke up.”

She held out her hand expectantly, and he grasped it hesitantly. The sandy bed suddenly left his feet, and he felt himself rising up and up and _up_ until his head breached the surface and water streamed down his face and he _breathed_ , felt his heartbeat begin to drum throughout his body and he laughed giddily at the feeling of life, all around him. Birds sang, insects chirped, the wind picked up and he felt the cool breeze on his wet body and it was _wonderful._

He swam his way to a shallow area, standing up and looking around him. There was no indication of another human being, and he briefly wondered who and where Freya’s husband was before he heard his name being torn from a throat, choked and sad.

“ _Arthur_.”

His eyes landed on a figure, and he couldn’t believe his eyes.

Merlin.

It was Merlin.

Merlin, dressed in strange clothes and looking at him with shock and disbelief and sadness and happiness all at once. Merlin, whose eyes looked ancient, older than they should have on his young face, and that immediately screamed wrong to Arthur. Those were the type of eyes that belonged on the oldest of men, not on his clumsy servant who complained all the time.

“Merlin.” A wide grin broke out onto his face and he began to walk out of the lake as quickly as he could, wrapping his old friend in a hug. He felt Merlin tense, still in shock, before arms reached up and returned the hug lightly, like he was afraid he was going to break him. After another moment, the arms tightened, and Merlin suddenly started shaking- Merlin was _crying_ \- and muttering something in a strange language, slipping in and out of the one Arthur was familiar with.

“-real. You’re real, you’re real, you’re real, you’re-”

_I’m real?_

_Why wouldn’t I be real?_

“Yes, Merlin, I’m real.” He said slowly, kindly, like he was speaking to a frightened child. That brought Merlin out of his mantra- still in that odd language, when had Merlin known another language?

That seemed to be the confirmation he needed, because Merlin pulled himself from the embrace and wiped his tear-stained cheeks and eyes and managed him a weak smile. “Sorry. I just….” he trailed off. “You’ve been gone for a long time.”

“Can’t have been that long, otherwise you’d look older. Although, what _are_ these ridiculous things you’re wearing, _Mer_ lin?” Indeed, seeing Merlin in something other than his neckerchief and regular outfits that he never seemed to take off was unfamiliar and strange.

He didn’t like it.

“I’m the one who looks ridiculous? You’ve just walked out of a lake after being dead for-” He cut himself off, an odd and sad expression flitting across his face.

Arthur took careful notice of that, but moved on with the conversation as he realized something.

“The Lady of the Lake said that her husband was waiting on the shore. And I see no one else around…” His eyes widened as Merlin began to blush a brilliant scarlet.

“You’re her husband?” It seemed even stranger, Merlin being married. “ _You_?”

Merlin gave him an annoyed mock-glare, the effect tampered down by the fact that his face still retained some red. “Yes, me. Is that so hard to believe, _prat_?”

“It’s just that...she’s so pretty and you’re so…” He gestured to Merlin with his hands and gave him a smirk.

“Oi!”

Oh, the times had definitely changed, yes. But the two sides of the coin were reunited at last, both feeling whole once more, and none in all of the world could be as happy as those two.

Well…

“What do you _mean_ I’ve been dead for _over a thousand years_?!”

**Author's Note:**

> P l e a s e review!
> 
> P.S. If you didn't already know, the language that Merlin is slipping in and out of is our modern English. He's going from that to Old Brittonic. Or Brythonic, whichever word you prefer.


End file.
